School officials must wrestle with holiday activities that have religious themes
As public schools enter the winter holiday season, school officials must wrestle with how much of the holiday activities can have a religious theme. While courts in general have approved religious motifs provided they are for educational purposes, the legal reasoning gets murkier when dealing with the details of specific holiday displays, programs, and celebrations in the schools. The patchwork of approaches individual schools throughout the nation have taken has led to increased litigation, which in turn has led to the involvement of advocacy groups seeking change in school district policies and practices regarding holiday celebrations. Alliance Defense Fund (ADF), a Christian legal group, has announced that it has 800 attorneys available nationwide to file suit if a school prohibits religious Christmas songs in its concerts.
Meanwhile, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) is poised to bring a suit if it perceives a school has overstepped the bounds of separation of church and state. For example, in 2004 the ACLU sued a Louisiana school district for displaying a nativity scene on campus and including religious songs in its holiday program. The suit was later dismissed. Schools fall into distinct camps regarding inclusion of religious music in holiday concerts. For example, some schools avoid all religious references during school concerts by limiting the songs performed to generic, secular ones, such as Frosty the Snowman and Jingle Bells. Other schools will sprinkle in songs from a variety of religions along with secular holiday music. Pinnacle High School in Phoenix, Arizona has planned a concert that will feature a Hanukkah song and Benjamin Britten's A Ceremony of Carols, which features several religious old English songs. On the other hand, Yavapai Elementary School in Scottsdale, Arizona will avoid religious Christmas music altogether. ADF sued Plano Independent School District (TX) in federal court last year after the district prohibited students from wearing red and green to winter parties and banned students from exchanging candy canes containing religious messages. ADF also sued an Oklahoma City-area school that banned a nativity scene and the hymn Silent Night from the holiday play while allowing symbols celebrating Hanukkah and Kwanzaa. Performance of Silent Night was added back to the play. Although the U.S. Supreme Court has ruled a nativity scene is constitutional if displayed for a non-religious reason such as to celebrate the holiday, attorneys advise schools that it is best to display a variety of holiday symbols to ensure the display will pass constitutional muster. Charles Haynes, senior scholar with the First Amendment Center, points out that some schools try to sidestep litigation over holiday celebrations by avoiding religious songs or displays altogether. He says, "A lot of people are frustrated that there are a lot of schools that haven't worked this through."
Arizona Republic
By Anne Ryman
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[Editor's Note: In December 2004 Legal Clips ran a special issue, below, devoted entirely to articles and cases concerning litigation over holiday celebrations in schools.]
[Legal Clips special holiday issue]